Gateshead 2: Ebbsfleet United 0: The Heed have kept their head

Liam Hatch celebrates after scoring for Gateshead and putting them on the road to avoiding relegation

Share

Get daily updates directly to your inbox

Thank you for subscribing!

Could not subscribe, try again laterInvalid Email

And relax . . .

A tumultuous, unprecedentedly nomadic season is at an end, and Gateshead are safe.

The Heed have kept theirs.

Ultimately, Anth Smith’s men did not have to win at the home of Middlesbrough yesterday. It would have been more typical, typical of their way of doing things, had they not.

But to their immense credit and character, victory made Stockport’s result at Kidderminster, a defeat as it happens, irrelevant.

So four months after getting shot of Ian Bogie, the former Heed boss is, alas, relegated after all.

What now, then, for his successor?

Smith took the reins, in December, with the play-offs still the target, only for the International Stadium quagmire to send the team on a tour of the North.

That saw them flirt with the drop but while their predicament was never likely to be as precarious as four years ago, when they clung on via goal difference, the job was still there to be done.

Yesterday, though tentative early on, they did it.

“It’s a relief,” said Smith, afterwards.

A scrappy opening saw James Marwood’s cross stabbed at keeper Lucas Menz by his team-mate Phil Walsh, and Menz save another shot from Marwood again, then Josh Gillies’ free-kick.

At the other end, Adam Bartlett saved from Ashley Carew and Nathan Elder, Liam Bellamy fired over and Jamie Chandler hacked Neil Barrett’s header off the line.

But the Heed ended the first half on top, Liam Hatch firing narrowly wide, and began the second more strongly still.

On 49 minutes, Hatch headed Gillies corner at goal, and though he appeared to grasp at the ball, Menz somehow fumbled it over the line.

Moments later, James Brown shot wide when he ought to have scored. But Gateshead don’t do things that way. They make you wait, make you sweat.

So we saw Elder scuff at Bartlett, and Liam Marum head wide. Bartlett gathered at the second attempt from Tom Phipp, and Joe Hone twice went close.

Later, Moses Ashikodi should have scored but was denied by Bartlett but by then, the ‘hosts’ had begun to look comfortable, and by the end the scoreline reflected as much. Cutting in from the right, Gillies’ strike was well saved by Menz, Marwood blasted a volley wide and Liam Henderson flashed an effort across the face of goal.

Then, deep into added time, Henderson converted Marwood’s centre for his first goal for the club, and the party really, to relief and rejoicing, began.